Kotoba Asobi : Shiritori – Learning the Japanese Style of Wordplay 3

In our last posts about kotoba asobi (Kotoba Asobi 1, Kotoba Asobi 2), we learned about kaibun and dajare. If the previous two types of Japanese wordplay are kind of serious, the next two types, though it needs deeper knowledge of Japanese vocabulary, are fun and can be played with two or more persons. This is the shiritori.

Shiritori

Shiritori (しりとり), literally means “taking the buttocks”) is a Japanese word game in which players take turns to say a word which begins with the final kana (equivalent of the English syllable) of the word given by the previous player. In the original rules of the game, no distinction is made between the three systems of Japanese language: hiragana, katakana, and kanji.

Basic rules of Shiritori

Two or more players take turns to play.

A player who plays/says a word that ends with the Japanese sound of n (ん) loses the game. That is because, there is no Japanese word that begins with that character.

Words should not be repeated. The player who says the repeated word loses.

Phrases connected by no (の) are permitted, but only in those cases where the phrase is sufficiently understood and considered as a “word”. Example of these words are onna no ko (女の子, which means a girl), te no hira (手の平, which means palm), and others.

Optional Rules

Dakuten and handakuten (diacritic marks) are often ignored. These marks are the one you see above the syllable to change its pronunciation. (e.g. は・ば・ぱ, which is ha, ba, and pa respectively). Thus, yuki (雪, ゆき, snow) can be followed with kinoko (キノコ, mushroom) or gitā (ギター, guitar). Another example is konoha (木の葉, このは, foliage), which can be followed with hamu (ハム, ham), or banana (バナナ, the banana fruit), or patokā (パトカー, patrol car).

A long vowel may either be ignored or considered as a vowel. For example, gitā (ギター, guitar) can be followed by either aki (秋, あき, autumn) or tani (谷, たに, valley).

Common pronouns and place names may be permitted. Example: Okayamajou (岡山城, Okayama Castle) is okay.

Two words spelled with the same kana but different kanji may be permitted. For example, hashi (はし) can be written in kanji as 橋 (bridge) or 箸 (chopsticks).

Small kana ya, yu, yo (ゃ,ゅ,ょ) are usually allowed to be interpreted as big kana や,ゆ, andよ.

Advanced Rules

Words are limited to a certain category.

Instead of the last kana, the next player must use the last two kana. In this case, only the first kana of the final two must not be n (ん).

The length of the word must be more than three or more syllables.

Here is an example of the game:

In this example, the player who played the word tsuushin loses because it ended with n.

Though there is an English equivalent for this game which is called the Word Chain, some invented an “English version” of the shiritori as an aid to learn English. Some modifications from the Japanese version:

The words must only be nouns, verbs, and adjectives.

Players cannot use different tenses of previously used verbs, unless they have nonstandard conjugation. For example, a player may use “be,” “was,” and “is,” but not both “punch” and “punched.”

When a word ends in a vowel, like “life,” one may use the preceding consonant instead.

Sponsored Links

Related Article/s:

Lohb’s photo in Flickr Can you eat using your bare hands? Or you need spoon and fork? Or perhaps a knife? Well for me, sometimes I do prefer eating using my hands and I am lucky there is no issue with it in our country. We used to eat using spoon and fork but oftentimes […]

Kendo has a very long and rich history of development in Japan. Some of the legendary sword masters of ancient Japan left writings to explain their philosophy and methods. Even though they are not really practitioners of the modern kendo, nevertheless, their philosophies and methods became a part of it. The following two tabs change […]

Happy New Year! Everything you do in the first days of the New Year can mean something or will affect the whole year. Hatsu or “first” of something are important according to Japanese culture: the first shrine visit, first dreams, and the first sunrise have impacts on how your year will turn out. The following […]

Last time, we talked about the sly kitsune or the Japanese fox. In this post, we will feature another animal that is popular in Japanese legends and myths and just like the kitsune, is sometimes depicted as a trickster, the tanuki or the Japanese raccoon dog. Tanuki, Not Your Ordinary Raccoon Though they look like […]

Japansese old hour system and “Jyuuni-shi” In the old times, “Jyuuni-shi” was more commonly used, for directions, dates and hours. In addition, Japanese hour system was totally different from the present one. Now those customs are gone, but you can find the traces of them in some words. [The word “oyatsu”] If you have […]

Onomatopoeias are always present in any language in the world. The hiss of the snake, the clanking of the bells, the drizzling of the rain – the words in italics are just some of the onomatopoeias that can be found in an English dictionary. The Japanese language too is full of onomatopoeias. Some of them […]

When I visited my wife’s parents’ home, I also went to a nearby shrine called Kibitsu shrine. At that time, an interesting ritual was being held. I’m going to introduce about it on this post. “Chinowa-kuguri” The ritual that has been held there is called “Chinowa-kuguri”. “Chinowa-kuguri” is one of the rites of “Nagoshi-no-harae”, which […]

Monkey in Japan Although “saru” is a general word for monkeys, I guess most of Japanese would think it refers to Nihon-zaru, Japanese monkey. It has fluffy coat, red face and red butt. There are many areas where wild monkeys live in Japan. I’ve never seen one, but I saw a warning like “Be careful […]

Today is the last day of the Golden Week this year in Japan. For this year, this day has no particular celebration or holiday. Today is just a Compensation/Substitute Holiday (振替休日 Furikae Kyūjitsu) that is observed when any of the Golden Week holidays fall on Sunday. Past Observances of Furikae Kyūjitsu Furikae Kyūjitsu of the […]

In our last post about Kotoba Asobi, we learned about Japanese palindromes or kaibun. In this post, we will learn another type of kotoba asobi which is the dajare or Japanese puns. The following two tabs change content below.BioLatest Posts harorudo Latest posts by harorudo (see all) Kaomoji: Expressing Emotions Through Text 2 – June […]